


When You're Lost and I'm Scared and You're Turning Away

by 221BSunsetTowers



Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo Stories [2]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: 9-1-1 on Fox, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Eddie Diaz Needs a Hug (9-1-1 TV), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s03e05 Rage (9-1-1 TV), Evan "Buck" Buckley Needs A Hug, Getting Together, Gunshot Wounds, Hurt Eddie Diaz, Love Confessions, M/M, Making Up, Protective Eddie Diaz, Protective Evan "Buck" Buckley, Sad Evan "Buck" Buckley
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:27:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25266841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221BSunsetTowers/pseuds/221BSunsetTowers
Summary: Set immediately following grocery store fight between Buck and Eddie.The thoughts are shoving against the back of Buck’s knees, filling every muscle with ache, deep ache, the kind that never leaves, as Buck watches Eddie leave.And so Buck doesn’t even flinch when there’s a press of metal against the back of his neck, because what does it matter anymore.Until Eddie jumps in front of the bullet.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Evan “Buck” Buckley & Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo Stories [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1826659
Comments: 24
Kudos: 399
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	When You're Lost and I'm Scared and You're Turning Away

**Author's Note:**

> Please note there are some mentions of blood in terms of a gunshot wound.
> 
> Title is from New Year's Day by Taylor Swift.
> 
> Story inspired by a prompt tied to the square Taking the Bullet from my Bad Things Happen Bingo card.
> 
> I'm really all up in my feelings today, have been for a while, so I decided to use that to write this.

Buck’s feet are frozen to the floor of the grocery store.

He can’t hear anything but the constant refrain of Eddie’s words, still there in his ears, like they’ve been plastered there permanently, like Eddie’s voice will never stop saying them, and there’s a part of Buck that’s okay with that, because at least that way Eddie will never stop talking to him.

The pain in Buck’s leg is throbbing in time with his heartbeat, and it’s the only way Buck knows that he’s still alive at all, because nothing feels right anymore, nothing ever will feel right anymore. He didn’t know, he couldn’t know, that this is where every decision he had ever made would lead to, but he should have.

He should have because everybody leaves him someday.

And his feet are frozen to the grocery store floor because he’s never the one to leave.

Buck can tell by the stiff set of Eddie’s shoulders that there’s so much more he wants to say but can’t. Buck can tell by the way one foot, Eddie’s right foot, is still pivoted slightly back towards Buck that Eddie wants nothing more than to turn back but can’t. It’s for the best, Buck knows, Buck knows any more of those words from Eddie would bring him to his knees.

At least this way, Eddie can leave Buck standing. Eddie won’t be there to watch Buck shatter, so Buck won’t add another exhausting burden to those so stiff shoulders. He doesn’t know who will be there now for Eddie, to help him shoulder the weight he so often refuses to put down.

Bosko?

Buck doesn’t know. He doesn’t get to know. Eddie’s words have made it perfectly clear he doesn’t deserve to know. Was everything so exhausting to Eddie? Every shared bottle of beer, every late night conversation before the alarms sounded, every text message inside joke and nudged knee and hand brush and shared key and no need to knock, was all of that just an unwelcome sensation in the back of Eddie’s brain, a buzzing that would fade as Buck faded away too?

The thoughts are shoving against the back of Buck’s knees, filling every muscle with ache, deep ache, the kind that never leaves, as Buck watches Eddie leave.

And so Buck doesn’t even flinch when there’s a press of metal against the back of his neck, because what does it matter anymore. His body is concrete, his lungs are full of sharp gravel, and his heart isn’t even stone it’s just gone.

The safety clicks off and it’s just a random voice, a teenage voice, shaking slightly as he orders Buck not to move, and Buck laughs, the first sound to exit his mouth since Eddie’s words turned him to stone.

Buck couldn’t move even if he wanted to, and he doesn’t want to anyway.

He says that to the kid, says “I don’t want to move,”, and there’s not a single shred of fear in his voice, but as he meets Eddie’s eyes, there’s such deep fear there. Buck knows what it’s for, Eddie’s scared he won’t get back to his son, but Buck would never let that happen. That, at least, is something Buck can do right.

He says that to the kid, says “Thank you,” thank you for this opportunity to do something worthwhile, thank you for picking me and not Eddie. The look on Eddie’s face when Buck sounds so grateful to a teenager holding a pistol to his exposed neck, that look right there is so confused and shattered and aching that Buck can’t even pretend to understand.

“Yeah, ok,” the kid mumbles, reaches behind him for the sack of cash he must have threatened out of the cashier and Buck didn’t even register that, and he’s grateful once again, because that means his senses are staying turned off and maybe he won’t feel it when there’s no need of a hostage anymore and the inevitable happens.

“This was inevitable,” Buck tells Eddie, and now that the words have started, they won’t stop. Buck tries so hard but they won’t stop, and they hurt so much coming out Buck would double over if that gun wasn’t forcing him upright. “Everyone leaves me, Eddie you know that, it’s okay, I’m going to leave now,” and Buck is so grateful to that kid when he cold cocks him with the gun, finally letting Buck hit the ground, the blood dripping into his eyes and mouth blocking the deluge of words before love can come out and make this even more exhausting on Eddie.

Buck hears Eddie cry out.

Buck raises his hand, it feels like moving it through a riptide, fingers suddenly shaking everywhere, but he forces the digits back together enough to hold his hand steady in the universal sign for stop, pointing it where he knows Eddie was standing last.

The kid roughly jerks Buck back to his feet, and shoves him towards the door, and Buck goes willingly. There’s no sounds now, and Buck wishes Eddie’s anger was back in his ear.

It would be nice to have the last thing he hears be Eddie’s voice.

But this is not what he meant, Buck thinks frantically, as he hears Eddie scream “No!” and suddenly Buck’s body is pushed out of the way, and as he hits the floor and hears the gun go off, every sense comes rushing back into his body and he could curl up and wail with the pain from that overload. He has not been shot, and that hurts more than anything, because he knows what that means.

Buck sees blood, spilling from Eddie’s side as his back arches off the floor in pain, as Eddie groans and moans and rolls and slides in his own blood, and Buck’s body is someone still whole somehow as he crawls desperately towards Eddie.

“Eddie, Eddie, oh god, Eddie, why did you do that, shit, Eddie, oh god,” the words are spilling out of Buck’s mouth again and the blood is spilling out of Eddie’s side, and they both are helpless, bodies closer than they have been in months. Buck presses his hands on top of Eddie’s, pressing them together over the hole that just won’t close, and Eddie screams, and Buck screams too, screams sounds in an unending wail, lowering his body over Eddie’s as if to shield him two minutes too late.

Someone is pushing at him, and Buck pushes back, clings to Eddie’s hands, but then something still alive inside him recognizes, and there is his team, taking over, applying pressure and gauze and directions and there are sirens sounding, and Buck is running his fingers through Eddie’s hair and their foreheads are pressed together, and this time Eddie is the one who can’t get any words out.

When they load Eddie onto the stretcher, Buck’s feet remember how to leave that floor behind.

Later, he’ll hear that he spent the ambulance ride on his knees, gripping onto Eddie’s limp hand, whispering Eddie’s name over and over again to the unconscious man.

Buck will be forever grateful he will never remember any of this.

Buck feels like he reenters his body again when Eddie finally opens his eyes. It’s been a surgery, a bullet removal, a somehow no vital organs got hit report, and Buck wants to argue because what about his heart, why can’t he feel it anymore, but then they say someone can sit with Eddie and those are the only words Buck can be cognizant of.

Buck doesn’t sleep. He lays his head on the hospital mattress, lays his fingers on Eddie’s pulse and holds on tight.

When Eddie stirs, Buck feels it in his body, feels his side twinge with sympathy as a soft whimper escapes Eddie’s lips, and oh, there it is, Buck thinks, I can feel my heart again, it didn’t leave after all.

“Buck?” Eddie croaks out, and Buck shakes his head, can’t stop shaking it as he grabs the cup and pitcher from the side table and helps Eddie take a small sip.

“What the fuck, Eddie?” are not the first words Buck intends to say, but they explode out, and Buck realizes he is shaking, full body trembles, and of course now his body remembers how to move. Tears are pouring from his eyes, and he is gasping in air, and clutching at the sleeve of Eddie’s hospital gown, and he is a mess, an exhausting mess, and-

“Not a mess,” Eddie mumbles, and he slides his fingers over, wrapping them around Buck’s wrist, and says “Not exhausting,” and that is all Buck can take. He folds his head onto Eddie’s chest, and sobs, throat convulsing to get a breath in there somewhere, and the whole time Eddie’s fingers are holding on.

“ ‘m sorry,” Eddie says. Buck laughs hysterically, hiccups, continues crying, lifting his head to stare incredulously into Eddie’s eyes.

“You’re sorry?” Buck chokes out, and there his head goes, shaking from side to side again. “Eddie, you got shot. I fucked everything up already, and then it was supposed to be me, he had the gun on me, that was the right thing, what the fuck did you think you were doing!”

“We have a lot to talk about if you think you getting shot would have been the right thing.” Eddie’s voice cracks, and Buck stills, can’t stop his fingers from seeking out the sides of Eddie’s pale face, cupping it so softly. “Buck, that I could have ever made you think that-“ Buck starts to shake again, and Eddie leans into Buck’s touch, bringing Buck to stillness again.

“It’s okay,” Buck whispers, and Eddie is the one to shake his head this time.

“It’s not,” Eddie insists, and he stops his head on one side, and he softly kisses the palm of Buck’s hand, and says, “But it’s going to be,” and oh, Buck thinks, oh yes.

Later, Eddie will be released from the hospital, and Buck will move in with him and Christopher, wrap Eddie with blankets and his body like warm armor.

Later still, he will trace the lines of Eddie’s body with his lips, and Eddie will tell him the fading bruises are from fighting pain that was never going to go away but now he doesn’t need that anymore, and Eddie will tell him the puckered scars are from a country far away and a friend he couldn’t save. Buck will press kisses into every scar, and when he reaches the newest one, he will pause, close his eyes, and Eddie will stroke a reassuring hand through his hair. Buck will let his lips rest the longest on this one, before he raises himself up and finds Eddie’s mouth again.

“Oh,” Buck will say, “oh I love you,” and Eddie will smile, a grin Buck will swear rivals the sun, and say, “There’s my heart, my love,” and wrap his arms around Buck, holding him close.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I'm ciaimpala on tumblr, come say hi and feel free to leave me prompts!


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